Unearthed 1988 video shows Nirvana playing in Radio Shack
Everyone has to start somewhere.
For Nirvana, that was at an empty Radio Shack in Aberdeen, Washington on Jan. 24, 1988.
A recently unearthed video shows Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic and Dale Crover in the temporarily shuttered store while they play along to "Paper Cuts."
Mike Ziegler, a Nirvana superfan who has surfaced several of the band's videos before, posted the YouTube video and explained its origins.
"The day before, on January 23rd, 1988, Nirvana (Ted Ed Fred at the time) recorded their first proper studio demo with Jack Endino at Reciprocal Recording Studios in Seattle, WA," he wrote. "The demo and this video feature Dale Crover (of Melvins fame) on drums. Following the studio session on the 23rd, later that evening they played a live show at the Community World Theater in Tacoma, WA (if you pay close attention to this video, you can see footage of that show on the TV screens in the background). So fast forward to the next day and here are Nirvana at RadioShack making a music video of sorts. The music that is being lip synced was the demo made the day before (with 'live' drums)."
A 20-year-old Cobain lip-syncs and flails against a backdrop of old-school TVs and and other electronics while Novoselic throws himself on the ground in this very lo-fi video.
Take a look at the early cuts of the legendary grunge band in possibly their grungiest video ever -- for now, at least.